Sealing the Flower Needle (2)
Before she knew it, the sun was sinking. The light of the crimson sunset was warm. It was the first time she had seen the palace in daylight, and even now she found herself craning her neck to look around.
How far had they walked? The imposing roof of what looked like the main hall came into view. Stepping inside, they entered a vast central chamber floored with polished stone. Ministers and soldiers filled the space, and among them, the prisoners of war dragged out from the fallen kingdom of Danya.
"H-Her Highness the Princess!"
"Her Highness the Princess!"
It was Sekwang who recognized her first, and at his cry the other soldiers lifted their heads and looked at her as well. She could see it—the fury and sense of betrayal welling up in the eyes of men who had shouted her name with joy at first. And they had every right to feel it. They were caked in blood and dust, drenched in fear and agony, while she alone stood there scrubbed clean and dressed in splendor. What else would they think?
The king abandoned his people and fled. The princess betrayed them and came here.
Seoin turned her head away from their eyes and instead fixed her gaze squarely on the king seated upon the raised terrace. So this was the plan, was it? You dressed me up so carefully just to make my own soldiers feel despair and betrayal?
Step by step. No one stopped her as she approached him. Then, at the foot of the steps leading up to the terrace, the military officer who had escorted her blocked her path. Seoin halted and bowed her head to the king, offering the barest courtesy.
"What do you think?"
The king's eyes were on her, but somehow the question did not seem meant for her.
"When word came of a princess Danya sent to the battlefield before even sending her to the bridal chamber, I wondered if something might be wrong with her. What say you all?"
And indeed, as expected, the words were directed at the ministers.
"Hmph. Your Majesty, she is a princess of the enemy nation. Worse still—what of the grievances of the Museon soldiers who died at that woman's own hand?"
Grand Commandant Jang Uhan, who had led his troops into the city only that day, rebuked the king in a thunderous voice. The other ministers quickly joined in.
"Quite right. What will the people say? The enemy princess must be executed, as is proper."
"If you must spare her, let her live as a slave. How can you trust a princess of an enemy nation and take her into the harem?"
Even as they clamored for her death, Seoin stood composed, her eyes locked with the king's. When the ministers' furious protests finally began to die down, Seon Wiyeon spoke.
"She is not a princess of an enemy nation, but of a fallen one. Surely you can afford the magnanimity of taking in a princess who has no country to return to, no family left in the world."
"It would be no magnanimity, Your Majesty—it would be a mistake."
"You call her a fallen princess, and that makes her all the more dangerous. What heart would a woman who was once the princess of a nation have, meekly becoming your concubine? This is clearly done in pursuit of revenge."
"Moreover, that princess was a general. To keep her at your side is perilous beyond measure."
"Look at her even now. In a moment when she should be begging for her life, she dares hold her head high and meet your eyes, Your Majesty! If you truly wish to show mercy, keeping her as a slave would be the proper course."
The ministers stood poised to refuse, no matter what, the royal command granting Seoin a concubine's patent. But the king tilted his head with easy composure and said:
"My seed may already be growing in the princess's womb. I can hardly do that."
"…"
"And surely the princess herself, rather than cling to a dead nation, would wish to live as a mother—for the sake of the child in her belly?"
A silence swept through the hall. It was not astonishment. They knew it already, it seemed, but had no words with which to rebut him. In the hush that fell—
"Then, Your Majesty—how about granting the princess a choice?"
Prime Minister Yu Sookhyun broke the silence.
"The matter is already settled with the princess. She agreed to become my concubine; that is why she stands here."
"To choose one thing is to cast another aside, is it not? If the princess has truly resolved to abandon her country altogether and become a concubine of Museon, then she need only show that resolve to everyone present."
"And how would one show what lies in the heart?"
"Simply. Order the princess to put that man there to death."
"!"
Seoin flinched and looked where the Prime Minister was pointing. At his fingertip, her aide Sekwang sat kneeling, his face frozen in dismay.
"Now that sounds amusing."
"!"
Her head whipped back toward the king. In the same instant, Seon Wiyeon hurled a sword toward her. It clattered to the ground at her feet. Seoin did not look down at it; she only glared at the king with sharp eyes. The ministers, seeing the expression on her face, were smirking among themselves. From the princess's face, it seemed the king's will would not be done this time.
Seoin, meanwhile, kept recalling the king's parting words—play cleverly. Did he truly want her own men to die at her hand?
It's no different from what was promised.
She wanted to argue that, but thinking it through, he had never actually promised to spare the prisoners. Still, looking at that insufferably handsome face wearing its ever-languid, sly smile, Seoin understood for certain. It's up to me, then.
He had no intention of killing the prisoners at all, it seemed. And she had also realized that the ministers here were backing her into a corner in order to press the king. So this is my use. To keep from being torn apart by that pack of jackals he called ministers, the king had thrown her out as bait. And now he wished to watch them lose their prey before his very eyes and be humiliated for it.
It was time to prove her true worth. The battlefield was not a bedchamber—it was here. Seoin picked up the sword. Then she turned and walked slowly toward Sekwang. He looked up at her, his face drained white, lips fluttering as though he had something to say—then simply squeezed his eyes shut. Seoin rested the point of the blade against his neck and spoke quietly.
"This man is my most cherished aide. He is the one I trust most in this world."
With those words, Seoin abruptly raised the sword high—and hurled it at the Prime Minister.
"Gah!"
Thud.
Everyone recoiled in horror. The sword stood embedded in the gap between the Prime Minister's legs, quivering where it had sunk into the stone floor. Thrown a hand's length farther, it would have punched straight through his body. Or else severed his aged member outright. The eyebrows of Prime Minister Yu Sookhyun trembled violently.
"What—what is the meaning of this outrage!"
Seoin paid no heed whatsoever to the minister's furious outburst. Instead, facing the king, she sank gracefully to her knees and began to report with the utmost courtesy.
"To betray once is difficult; to betray twice or three times is easy. Would Your Majesty trust a person who betrays his own so readily, and keep him at his side?"
Fortunately, days of eating well and resting had restored her voice from its parched rasp to something clear and bright. Even amid all this, Seoin was grateful that her voice, filling the great hall, sounded anything but wretched.
"If you need a pretext to kill me, then kill me outright. It would make a better sight to die alongside this man than to die as some pathetic traitor."
"Your Highness!"
At the touch of gratitude in Sekwang's voice, Seoin felt a flicker of guilt. This had not been a path chosen to save him.
"Yes! Precisely! Our princess has never betrayed anyone! Once she gives her heart, she carries it through to the very end—she is loyalty itself! To welcome a woman like Her Highness as a concubine would be a blessing upon Museon!"
Having had her loyalty proven before his eyes, Sekwang's voice rang out with rather too much force.
"A princess who led her own nation to ruin, swearing to become concubine to the king of the enemy—if that is not betrayal, what would you call it!"
At the Grand Commandant's roar, the other ministers nodded along. But Sekwang thrust out his chest and answered with pride.
"You simply don't understand! It wasn't the princess who betrayed the country—it was the country that betrayed Her Highness! The king abandoned his own daughter! Think on it! Her own father threw his daughter onto a battlefield that was nothing short of a slaughterhouse, and used the chaos to flee! Used without limit, then discarded—what does the title of princess amount to? She has nothing, not a scrap! Honestly, how could anyone not pity her!"
Seoin's flicker of guilt toward Sekwang evaporated entirely. She was mortified. I should have just killed him.
Just as that thought crossed her mind—
"Pfft."
A laugh burst from the king's lips. It was a small sound, but every head in the hall turned toward him upon hearing it.
"Ah. Forgive me, in the midst of such sorrow."
"…"
The atmosphere turned strangely awkward. One thing was certain, though: his laughter had dissolved all the tension. So thoroughly that the ministers' bristling accusations and clamor now seemed utterly pointless and hollow.
"Ahem. Now that I hear it, is she not truly pitiable? A beautiful princess who took the field in place of an incompetent king to save her people, only to be abandoned by her own country and have her head taken by the enemy. Tsk."
Seoin could detect no sincerity in his brief click of the tongue. No doubt the others heard it the same way. If only he had poured genuine feeling into it, it might have been more moving—but the performance's evident emptiness left her a little uneasy.
"What a tale the people will love. They'll be weeping over it for the next hundred years. Tell me—will I be remembered as a cruel and savage king? What say you, Prime Minister?"
A poor princess without a single ally. Kill her, and all he would gain was the people's pity. Worse, it would only sow resentment among the people of Danya, who were now to become the people of Museon. Every minister grasped this. They were merely watching the Prime Minister's face. To him, whose own daughter held rank in the palace, the princess would become a formidable obstacle.
Reading the mood, the Prime Minister bowed his head.
"The princess of Danya appears to be nothing more than a powerless woman with nowhere left to turn. That much has been proven—yet my suspicion that she may one day threaten Your Majesty's life remains unchanged. Someone must harbor such suspicions, must they not? It is done for Your Majesty's safety, so I ask that you do not take my suspicion amiss."
"Good. Such a man has his place. If there are no further objections, I shall grant the princess the patent of Noble Consort Hwa. Henceforth, address her not as the princess of Danya, but as Hwa, Noble Consort of Museon. And tonight, hold a banquet for the soldiers who returned alive from this great victory, and distribute grain to the people of the capital."
"Hurrah!"
Amid the soldiers' thunderous cheers, the ministers could not utter a single objection.
More than relief at her own survival, Seoin envied the soldiers' roar. Unable even to offer comfort to her captured men, she wanted nothing more than to escape this place as quickly as she could.